CCI Bioinformatics research assists in global effort to stress importance of viruses in soil

Dr. Richard Allen White III — Assistant professor of bioinformatics in UNC Charlotte’s College of Computing and Informatics and the North Carolina Research Campus — along with a global group of scholars argue the scientific community’s understanding of the causes and impacts of global climate change could be deepened by paying more attention to how viruses affect soil.

Earlier this year, White and a group of collaborators spanning 20 different international research organizations published a thought provoking article in the journal Nature Microbiology on the topic of the various roles viruses play within soil ecosystems. This project — a comprehensive meta-analysis of dozens of studies and research literature that covered viral processes, the complex biomes of soil ecosystems, and how the two overlap and interact — was borne out of a years-long collaboration sparked at a gathering of virologists in Denmark in 2022. 

“There’s a viral link to soil processes that’s historically been neglected,” White explained. “When climate scientists create models for climate change, they typically focus on measuring carbon dioxide above ground, but in terms of everything below ground, including viruses, we’re just not measuring those processes as well.”

Over the course of two years, White and his colleagues integrated numerous studies toward the goal of successfully making the case that viruses play an important yet under-examined part in soil health and fertility, a role that if better investigated could provide new perspectives on the causes and measurable effects of global climate change. 

“Viruses infect all domains of life within soil, and they are critical within food-web dynamics that will add to our understanding and must be applied to future climate models,” said White. “We stress that viruses must be considered as key regulators of soil food web dynamics and biogeochemical cycling within soils and the rhizosphere including their impact on soil health and fertility,” said White. “This project is another example of the multinational, inter-institutional research that UNC Charlotte researchers are helping make possible,” White said.

Read the full article here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41564-024-01767-x